The coroner identified the 58-year-old man who was fatally electrocuted outside his Fairfax home after Friday’s storms.
Russell McKinney was electrocuted outside his Warren Avenue home around 7:45 p.m. July 17, according to the Hamilton County Coroner’s Office and dispatch reports.
Neighbors who spoke with The Enquirer said McKinney was well-regarded throughout the neighborhood and a long-time resident.
“Russ was a good guy,” neighbor Robert Perkins said. “I knew him since he was 12.”
Village officials extended condolences to McKinney’s family in a post on Facebook.
“Several of us who work at the Village grew up with Russ and we are so saddened by this tragic loss,” officials said.
Emergency personnel were called to McKinney’s home after neighbors pulled him out of floodwaters, the dispatch reports indicate.
A Fairfax police officer who was the first to respond to the home began performing CPR while medics were on the way. McKinney was declared dead minutes later.
Two neighbors who helped pull McKinney from the floodwaters were also electrocuted and evaluated by medics. They were found to be in stable condition, according to dispatch reports.
Muddy water lingered behind McKinney’s home two days after the flash flooding. Electrical cords could be seen hanging from the garage to a nearby boat.
Fairfax, a small village of 1,700 just south of Madisonville, received between 4 to 5 inches of rain after several rounds of storms this weekend, according to the National Weather Service. Flooding from the storms overwhelmed businesses and homes across Cincinnati’s East Side and eastern Hamilton County.
McKinney’s death is the only reported fatality stemming from this weekend’s storms across the region. Two people were injured in Fairfax and another person was injured in Cincinnati and taken to the hospital, but their injuries were not life-threatening, fire officials said.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Coroner identifies Fairfax man killed in flash flooding
Reporting by David Ferrara, Cincinnati Enquirer / Cincinnati Enquirer
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By David Ferrara, Cincinnati Enquirer | USA TODAY Network
